Conservative Values, Politics
Hot shots: Should a state force girls as young as 9 to take a three-phase vaccination that prevents infection from a sexually transmitted disease which could lead to cervical cancer, even if it’s recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (which, by the way, advocates abstention as the best form of birth control)? Does this not sound plain wrong? According to the Virginia Pilot, it’s a question that the Virginia state legislature will have to answer, thanks to the lobbying efforts of — you guessed it — a drug company.
Del. Phillip Hamilton, R-Newport News, has introduced a bill that would add the human papillomavirus vaccine to the list of immunizations needed for school attendance, and if it passes, it would go into effect in time for the 2008 school year. But when was the last time you heard of a Republican proposing a health measure for the greater good? Right, Hamilton makes a weasel’s excuse for volunteering to sponsor the bill:
Hamilton said pharmaceutical company representatives approached him about submitting the bill, probably because he chairs the House Committee on Health, Welfare and Institutions. Drug companies have been among the largest contributors to Hamilton’s election campaigns.
“Probably?” You bet, Phil. And keep cashing those checks, buddy.
While the vaccination is mandatory for school attendance, the bill does provide that parents can opt out on moral, religious or just creepy grounds, just because they feel a little queasy about vaccinating their 9-year-old against a sexually transmitted disease. Not to mention that the bill would seem to undermine Virginia’s Abstinence Education Initiative, which is run by the state health department.
Not to belittle the seriousness of cervical cancer, but there are apparently about 10,000 cases of it diagnosed in the United States every year, and about 3,700 women die of cervical cancer annually. And the papillomaviruses are so common (there are 100 strains) that 75 percent of all sexually active women will likely become infected at some point, and of those, only about 1 percent will develop cervical cancer.
To me, that does not indicate a pressing need to vaccinate milions of schoolgirls who may or may not engage in safe or unsafe sex.
But then, I don’t work for the pharmaceutical industry like Philip Hamilton does.
Topics: Conservative Values, Politics
Sorry Buckaroo. I think you’re dead (pun intended) wrong on this one. But you might have to have two x genes to understand why. Suffice it to say, if there’s a vaccination out there that will free women from the fear of cervical cancer, I’m for it. I’m no fan of drug companies or the insurance industry but I bet millions and millions more are spent every year on pap smears than would be spent on vaccines. And if there were a vaccine for prostate cancer, I’ll wager you’d favor giving it to boys at any age. But this entirely sane initiative will probably be fought by lots of folks who believe in the myth of abstinence education and find the idea of girls they know having sex “creepy.”
Au contraire, ma chere Trish, I am all for the freedom to be vaccinated, just opposed to the state making it a condition of enrollment in public school. I mean, it’s not something that is going to get passed around in third grade. Look, I was vaccinated against polio and small pox when I was a child, but those are completely different kinds of infectious diseases that are transmitable in more than one way, and therefore it is in the interest of the state to control their spread. Similarly, if there were a vaccine available for avian flu I would favor mandatory vaccination, but in this case I don’t think it’s warranted. I think the Virginia Health Department should throw some abstinence-marketing dollars behind a vaccination campaign to educate girls and their parents, but I don’t think the state should be mandating vaccinations. The newspaper article noted that not all insurance companies cover the $360 vaccination, and I don’t think the bill calls for the state to pay. So how do the poor and uninsured pay for their “mandatory” vaccinations?